


Happy Birthday, Dr. Caustic

by jimikat



Category: Apex Legends (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Spoilers for Pathfinder’s Quest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-25
Updated: 2021-02-25
Packaged: 2021-03-16 13:15:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29701119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jimikat/pseuds/jimikat
Summary: It had been precisely two hours and forty-nine minutes since Caustic had given up on hearing from Ms. Paquette.He hopes the knock on his door will be her. It isn’t.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 26





	Happy Birthday, Dr. Caustic

**Author's Note:**

> This has some spoilers for the Crypto chapter in Pathfinder’s Quest, so be aware of that!

It had been precisely two hours and forty-nine minutes since Caustic had given up on hearing from Ms. Paquette. Even so, his phone sat on the side table by his recliner, face up, waiting, hoping for something. Anything.

It had remained silent all day, as it often did. Even owning a phone had been at the insistence of the Apex Games, that they could more easily contact him. There had only been one person to regularly use it. And she was not currently speaking to him.

He should just go to bed. Even at this late hour, it was earlier than he was accustomed to retiring, but the waiting felt unbearable.

And that’s when the knock on the door jarred him from his languor.

His heart leapt, and he was embarrassed to admit that fact. Her face, sweet and smiling, flashed across his vision. He scrambled from his chair, forced himself to take slow, careful strides to the door, mind full of words he wanted to say to her. Words he had mulled over time and time again. He was ready now, he thought. Ready to express regret. Ready to repair what he had broken.

He threw open the deadbolts, grasped the handle firmly, and tugged the door open, heart in his throat.

Standing there, expression reticent and on edge, was not Natalie Paquette.

But Crypto.

Caustic’s face fell, lips that had been bent in an expectant half-smile now twisted down. He snapped the door shut without a word, but a boot lodged itself firmly in the doorway. Caustic heard a wincing hiss, but the boot remained firmly in place.

“We need to talk,” Crypto murmured, his voice far less willing than the words indicated. Caustic groaned, but ripped the door back open. He stepped forward, looming over the young man, a snarl twisting his face.

“There is absolutely nothing I have to say to you, boy. Leave,” Caustic growled. Crypto narrowed his eyes, annoyance showing through as a corner of his lip curled.

“You threaten me regularly and force your way inside my home at your leisure, but I can’t even ask to talk?” Crypto asked.

“That is correct. So you have a brain, after all.”

“It will just take a minute,” Crypto entreatied, trying his best to keep his tone even. “It’s about Natalie.”

Crypto could see the name spark something in those green eyes, something that softened them, something that made even Crypto feel sorry for him. In that brief moment, this wasn’t the sociopathic, manipulative man who had tried to turn everyone against him. He was just a lonely old man who didn’t know how to fix something he’d so thoroughly broken.

Caustic shifted aside, eyes glued to his feet, and Crypto stepped inside.

The apartment was small, and significantly more homey than Crypto had been expecting. The entire area was lit by several warmly glowing lamps. The walls were stark white, but they contrasted the vast amounts of plants well. Golden drapes hung over a surplus of windows. Crypto could imagine in the day this room would be open and bright, an environment that seemed to suit Caustic’s plants better than the man himself. The kitchen was well-used but not dirty, a counter with bar seating showing evidence of a half-finished dinner for one. A recliner sat before a small television. A loveseat, worn, had been shoved into a corner with far less thought. It looked out of place. And, judging by the plethora of clothing, mail, and books piled upon it, it hadn’t been used in some time.

Caustic made no move to invite him further in, simply standing with his arms crossed over his sizeable chest, glaring down at the young man. Crypto found himself shrinking back, shoving his hands deep into his pockets and not quite able to match Caustic’s intense gaze.

“Well? Are you here to gloat, _little brother?_ ”

Crypto’s face twisted. “Don’t call me that. And no, I’m… not here to… just… Natalie mentioned that it’s your birthday, and I--”

“I don’t need your pity, boy. If that’s all it is--” Caustic made to reach for the door knob.

“No, that’s not it.” Crypto squinched his face up, trying his best to get through this. He had wanted to just send the man a message. He had made the decision to come in person, no matter how much he had hated the idea. And he was going to see it through. For Natalie. “You and I seem to… have a lot of people in our lives that we both care about. So I thought I should… Felt like it was my job to... _Ssi-bal._ Maybe this was a mistake.”

And he expected Caustic to insist that it was, and demand he leave. But he didn’t. He turned away, moving to sit in the recliner. He lowered himself heavily into it, rubbing awkwardly at his beard as he settled back with a low, ragged groan. Despite everything in him wanting to get out of this situation, Crypto forced himself forward, perching uncomfortably on a bar seat at the counter. They sat in an awkward silence for a moment, two men whose lives were so interconnected and yet so disparate. Crypto didn’t always know how to start with even the easiest of conversations, and this certainly did not qualify.

Fortunately, Caustic broke the silence first.

“Have you been in contact with her recently?” he asked, his voice quieter, weaker than Crypto had ever heard it.

“Natalie?”

“No. My… _our_... Mystik.” The name felt unfamiliar on Caustic’s lips. He didn’t care for it. But the use of it softened the tense shoulders of the boy across from him.

“Oh. A little. It isn’t safe to contact her often, but… I keep tabs on her. She’s fine.”

“I see.”

The silence fell again. Awkward and heavy but not filled with murderous intent. Perhaps this was progress.

“She spoke of you,” Crypto said, grasping at anything to make this less torturous. “Has a picture of your graduation photo in the living room, above her chair. She would always talk about how smart her son was. Growing up, I didn’t eat properly, and she used to tell me I needed to eat so I could grow big and strong like him. I didn’t want to disappoint her.”

Caustic grunted. He knew the photo. He had hung it, exactly where she’d asked. He wasn’t certain if it made it better or worse to know she still kept it there, to know she still clung to a life he had left behind long ago.

“It seems both of us proved quite competent at disappointing her. Unless, that is, she had always dreamed of raising a pair of murderous sons.”

“I’m not--” Crypto caught himself, reigning himself back in, hissing a curse under his breath. “Why do you do that?”

“Do what.”

“Push away the people who want to help you.”

Caustic barked a cold laugh. “Is that what you’re trying to do? Help me?”

“I’m trying to--”

“Isn’t it enough that you won? Must you come here and remind me of it?”

Crypto scowled, eyeing the man as if he couldn’t believe the words. “Won? Nobody won, Caustic. You tried to manipulate everyone, and everyone lost.”

“And yet you are still in communication with Ms. Paquette. I wouldn’t consider that a loss.”

“ _Joy young hee_ , you really are an idiot, aren’t you? She still cares about you, she just… _geuge_... She needs you to show the same.”

Caustic stiffened in his chair. His hands tightened into white-knuckled fists. “I have been attempting to--”

“No, you haven’t. You’ve been trying to move on. Moving on and apologizing are different things.”

Caustic grunted, dropping his gaze, staring at his hands as he forced them to relax in his lap. “There’s no point. I’ve already destroyed what I once had with Ms. Paquette. I see that now.”

Crypto watched him, watched the lines in his face sharpen, watched the shoulders sag as they finally bore the weight of the loss. He had no idea what Natalie ever saw in this man, what had made her, at one point, care for him. But that wasn’t his business. His friend was hurting because of a broken relationship. And he was here to try to help _Natalie_. Not Caustic.

He slipped from the stool, reaching into his jacket and pulling a manilla envelope from within. The crinkle of the envelope drew Caustic’s attention; sad, old eyes tried their best to look detached. Failing, Crypto thought, for the most part. He stepped towards Caustic, pressing the envelope towards him. Caustic didn’t move to take it.

“What is this,” he demanded, eyeing the package warily.

“Proof that she still cares. _Jal jayo,_ Alexander. Happy birthday.” Crypto dropped the envelope on Caustic’s side table, on top of a softly glowing phone with no notifications, then turned to leave.

Just as the door shut, long past any ability for the younger Legend to have heard, Caustic muttered a soft, “Thank you.”

He turned his attention to the unmarked envelope, and with tentative fingers pulled out the papers inside.  
There were at least a dozen lined sheets of paper within, maybe more, many heavily wrinkled. Some ripped. Blue ink in a soft, untidy scrawl he would recognize anywhere. Every single one began the same way.

_Dear Dr. Caustic._

Very few had endings. Some were paragraphs long, rife with scribbled out portions. Some were barely a sentence or two. Many ended mid-sentence.

He read every word. Passages chastising him, telling him he was acting childish, detailing out the various ways he had hurt her. Some were recounting how things had once been, begging him to explain why he had wanted to ruin it all.

He could feel the sharp sting in his eyes as he attempted to force back tears that refused to obey, cutting trails in his freckled skin and nestling into his beard. The last letter was short. The only one not abandoned, not crumped or ripped.

It had no salutation. Just two sentences.

“ _I just want you to say you’re sorry.  
I miss you._”

Caustic took a long, shuddering breath, running his thumb over those three, final words. It was, he thought, the first sign that she did still care.

And he _was_ sorry. It wasn’t a feeling he was accustomed to. Regret did not often follow in the wake of his actions. Remorse a near foreign concept. But when he thought about Natalie, about what his actions had done to her, he felt a pain in his chest and a nausea in his gut.

His hand reached for the phone by his side, thumbs feverishly pulling up her contact information. Hovering over the little green button that would call her. He wanted to hear her voice. He wanted to tell her he was sorry. That he wished he hadn’t done what he did. He would do anything to fix this. Would do anything to find himself, once again, able to enjoy her company.

And he almost pressed that button. But he imagined her voice on the other end. Cold and harsh, as it had so often become when directed at him, telling him to never call her again.

He closed her contact. Opened up his image gallery, where a single, solitary photo sat waiting for his return. He hadn’t asked for the small party she’d thrown for him last year. Just the two of them. He hadn’t wanted the cupcakes or the party hat that she had insisted he wear. He hadn’t wanted the commemorative photo that she insisted they take.

But now he clung to it, the only evidence that she had, at one point, not hated him. That, and a dozen unfinished letters.

Maybe she was better off without him. Better off with someone like Tae Joon Park, who would talk to someone he hated in hopes that it might make her happy.

Miles away, in her own apartment, Natalie Paquette sat curled up in her chair, a blanket wrapped around her, staring at a half-written text. She bit her lip, shaking her head. Every iteration so far had felt wrong. Just like every letter she had abandoned on the floor of her workshop.

She deleted the words she had struggled to form minutes ago and typed in a simple replacement.

_Happy birthday, Dr. Caustic._

She stared at the words, weighing them in her mind.

She watched the clock tick over to midnight, the date flicker to _February 26._ She sighed, closed the texting app, leaving yet another message unsent. She navigated to her photo gallery, scrolling through endless photos on her phone with the Legends who had become her family, until she found the right one. She stared at the people depicted, people from another life. Cupcakes and party hats and an insistence of a selfie. Her wide grin contrasted the slight twist at the corner of his lips as she leaned in close to take the picture. She zoomed in on their faces, taking a long, slow sigh.

“Happy birthday, Dr. Caustic,” she whispered to an empty room.  
  



End file.
